For those who have run or are running 100 miles a week or so.....?

I was either a college student or a high school teacher in those years. The school day was done by 3:00 or so and I'd do 10-15 miles after school, 12-13 was pretty typical. I'd make a sandwich afterwards, have a nap, watch TV until maybe 8:30 and then often do another 4-7 miles. Sometimes I'd grocery shop in that gap between runs. Then I'd have supper. Saturdays I usually did 12-15 in the morning and maybe another 4-7 in the afternoon and on Sundays I'd do a 17-22 mile run. I also recall going to laudromats and running while the clothes washed and dried circling back after about 40 minutes to shift them from the washer to the dryer. In the summers as a teacher I had all day to get my runs in and lengthened them a wee bit.

pure hell. i stopped. i've done better with lower millage.

HRE, teaching high school while running high volume, you sound like Bill Rodgers. Well, you don't sound LIKE Bill Rodgers himself, that guy is strange! But as you know he also fit in the miles around the h.s. schedule.

To the OP: I'm 26 and running over 100/week right now, and doing it successfully. But a few years ago after college I tried it for the first time and did it in a very unfruitful, counter-productive way. It's insightful of you to recognize immediately that the trick is being productive the rest of the day. I was a zombie the first time round. But I was also pretty unhealthy at that time in other ways. If you are healthy in terms of your sleep and nutrition (which means you have a sturdy immune system) than you can do it.

Everyone's situation is different. I work 3 part-time jobs, so everything is irregular for me. But training is a priority, my wife knows that and is okay with it, and I make it work. I need lots of sleep, occasional naps, I get in big long runs every 7-10 days, run doubles most days of the week, and frequently find myself working runs in around errands like HRE described.

Sorry that's so generic, but I just don't think it would help you for me to describe today for instance, with a weird work shift in the afternoon/evening.

I work 9 - 5-ish. Modays and Wednesday I work until 6 or 7, Tuesdays I take off around 4:45 and Thursdays I leave around 5:15. Fridays I leave by 3 and spend the extra time on laundry, food shopping and taking a nap.

I run 5 miles to work every day but Monday, the day I bring my clothes for the week. I run home Mon, Wed, Fri, between 5 - 8 miles, and Tuesday I run to run with friends which, yeah, is about 2.5 hours. I drink a gatorade along the way and have diner around 9 pm. Thursday is another longer day, about 10-12 miles. I only run singles on Saturday and Sunday, about 13-14 one day and then 18-20 on Sunday, or sometimes the other way around.

For diet, I usually have a piece of fruit before I run in the AM and then a sandwich and coffee after, fruit for snack, soup and crackers for lunch or another sandwich, then cookies or chocolate for snack, more coffee, a granola bar before I run, then dinner later at 8 or 9 pm, which is usually meat and vegetables or pasta with cheese. I admit, dinner usually involves a beer or two or red wine. I also don't bother with any low-fat crap. I figure the more calories, the better, although I've been trying to cut down on the sugar during the week. Weekends I eat whatever I feel like as running long runs sometimes cuts my appetite so I need to get in whatever it allows me.

Sleep is one thing I should improve on; I should be in bed now.

I really like my life. I don't ever think that I run too much. It's just right.

One of the first things I learned was that doing the "second run" at the traditional time, in the morning, was going to kill me because I had to be at school at 7:00 AM and no matter how tired I was I couldn't get to sleep much before 12:30-1:00 AM so getting up at say, 6:00 to do that run was awful. I found going out for the second run in the night was much more manageable. It was gratifying to learn a few years later that Mark Nenow did a similar thing.

I also think that having regular work or school hours is important. It helps a lot to have a set routine if you're going to do a lot of miles each day and it's really hard to have that if you're working 8-4 one week and 4-12 the next.

Gerry Lindgren's favorite workout is to run 40 miles, eat a cheese sandwich and have a soda and then run back home. That takes care of 80% of the 100 mile week and answers the diet question.

HRE wrote:

I also think that having regular work or school hours is important. It helps a lot to have a set routine if you're going to do a lot of miles each day and it's really hard to have that if you're working 8-4 one week and 4-12 the next.

As a shift worker currently running around the 100mile/wk mark I agree, it's not ideal - but it is doable. You just have to be flexible with when the serious workouts are (ideally on a day off) and long runs (ideally day off or late start day). Doubles are easily done with a 9-5 shift and if you are entitled to a break during shift no reason not to run at say 6pm during a 4-12 shift.

The day after a late finish can be difficult, and its often best left for an easy double. If you can just accept how it is and make the best of it after a while it's not a huge deal, just not as convenient as having a set routine.

I had a time like that and I did 100 or so in singles but often getting in doubles on days off. If you get 20-25 miles each day in on your weekend, whatever days may be your weekend, you only need 10-12 miles on your workdays to get to 100.

The best routine I got into this past summer was built around work. I started working at 8:30 and finished around 3:30. Every day I woke up at 7 to run 4 and then went out for my second after 5 when it got a little cooler out. Those runs were always 10 miles except for workout days.

Workout day's i'd run to the track (5 miles) and back after so those days were more around 13-17 depending.

Saturday and Sunday were longer. Usually a 10 and 10 on Sat and 18-22 on Sun but that was also subject to change. For instance, I would sometimes run a workout in the middle of one or both of the Saturday runs so at times I was as high as 27 on those days.

Just taking the very basics take (14 x 5) +20 +20 = 110. Clearly room some days for less or more but it's really not too hard to get to that level if you run a lot of doubles.

Great input guys, but I should have specified that I'm more interested in how you go the rest of the day feeling sharp/energized. Hell, right now I'm doing 80 mpw and am probably going to cut down to 50 just bc I have come to realize that I've been feeling zombie-like the rest of the day (legs tight, weak feeling, etc), and it's actually starting to matter (I'm a grad student now). When I was in undergrad, I spent a little time at 100 mpw, but it didn't really matter how I felt the rest of the day.

1. The upside of high mileage is that it reduces stress. That's because you are too tired to give a f*ck.

2. You need coffee to function. Inertia of any kind will turn into sleep.

3. 40-50 mpw means great sex. 100 mpw is no sex except on weekends after 10 hours of sleep. Too tired to lay the pipe.

Out.

There's no harm in cutting back 10% of your mileage every 2 or 3 weeks.

trying to get a clear picture wrote:

Great input guys, but I should have specified that I'm more interested in how you go the rest of the day feeling sharp/energized. Hell, right now I'm doing 80 mpw and am probably going to cut down to 50 just bc I have come to realize that I've been feeling zombie-like the rest of the day (legs tight, weak feeling, etc), and it's actually starting to matter (I'm a grad student now). When I was in undergrad, I spent a little time at 100 mpw, but it didn't really matter how I felt the rest of the day.

Well, if you're going to run 100+ miles a week you're going to be tired a lot of the time. Personally I do rely on 2 cups of reasonably strong coffee a day and also eat a shitload of mostly nutritious food.

Sleep is important, depends on the individual but personally I need at least 7 hours, ideally 8 or 9. Take an afternoon nap for an hour or so on days off if you need to.

I actually tend to feel most energized during or immediately after runs than beforehand or at random times during the day. Don't know if this is normal or just me though. Hope that helps a bit & good luck with it.

When I did it I did it this way:

Job was either 6-2 or 12-8.

On 6-2 days I'd run at 5am for a few miles...my "sleep walk run". Then after work I'd go 60-90 minutes.

On my 12-8 days I'd go 60-90 minutes at 10am then a few more miles after work.

There are 24 hours in a day use them wisely.

After a while, 90-110 miles a week becomes "normal" and you're really not that tired. In fact I would be in more of a funk if I let it slip down to the 60s/70s.

Alan

Wake-Up

6:00 - Coffee, Oatmeal, Fruit

9:00 - Some form of carb (hell, sometimes animal crackers)

11:00 - 10 Mile Run (Workout if scheduled)

12:30ish - Lunch at Desk (left overs and soup usually)

2:30 - Snack, whatever i can scavenge

5:00 - Dinner (wife cooks healthy stuff usually, mostly vegetarian)

7:00 - 7 Mile Run

8:30 - Ice Cream if i can find an excuse (What? you got an A on your quiz? Ice Cream!)

9:00 - In Bed

Avg 110-120mpw (7 Miler gets cut short some nights)

Oh and I drink water like its going out of style, but its been in the 100's lately

I wish i got more sleep, but its all i can do on my schedule. I'm active duty.

trying to get a clear picture wrote:

Great input guys, but I should have specified that I'm more interested in how you go the rest of the day feeling sharp/energized. Hell, right now I'm doing 80 mpw and am probably going to cut down to 50 just bc I have come to realize that I've been feeling zombie-like the rest of the day (legs tight, weak feeling, etc), and it's actually starting to matter (I'm a grad student now). When I was in undergrad, I spent a little time at 100 mpw, but it didn't really matter how I felt the rest of the day.

I do not feel energized/sharp the rest of my day (many days, not all) while running high mileage. The fact is I really only care about my running. My job (8-4) is simply what I do so I can support myself and thus continue to run, I do only what I need to in order to get by, as training takes up any time I could use for doing extra.

Are you really having problems with energy throughout the day, or is this just something you've heard? As long as you give yourself time to adapt, and aren't doing 6-7 workouts per week, and are sleeping at least some minimum amount, you should feel pretty normal. The only thing I notice is that my legs feel more tired after a few 18 mile days, but I'm still alert and normal at work.

One trick I used when building up miles and finding myself struggling at a particular level was to spend 2-3 weeks doing MORE mileage. E.g. if I was trying to do 110 and found that I was just not adjusting I'd do maybe two weeks at 120-125. That was really tough but afterward 110 felt fine.

As for the rest of the day, as I indicated, I've never been a morning person and teaching requires you to be up fairly early. So one way I dealt with that was to do my "morning run" in the evening. There was still a zombie like feeling most work days but I attributed that to having to be up earlier than I was suited for. I felt like a zombie in high school when I probably was running something like 5 miles a week.

I just took stiffness and soreness as a given. My times were improving quite a bit and I thought being stiff and occasionally sore was a small price to pay. I also reminded myself of Brendan Foster's line about how "a distance runner is someone who goes to bed at night feeling tired and wakes up the next morning feeling even moreso."

Don't run 100 mile weeks, but building towards mid 80s to 90. Here is what the schedule generally looks like.

Mon/Wed: Get up at 6:05, take 6:36 train to Grand Central, at desk by 7:15. Work all day, maybe sneak out for a run, maybe not. Regardless, take either the 5:56 or 6:18 train home. Get home between 6:35 and 7:00, eat dinner, put kids to bed at 8:00, and if I didn't run during the day, Mon run 7 miles and Wed run 9-10 miles. Shower, watch TV with wife for an hour, fall asleep.

Tue, Thur, Fri: Get up at 5:45AM, take 6:02AM train to Harlem 125th Street Get off at 6:27AM and run for an hour to work. At desk by 7:45-50 on these days. Bring work clothes and put in foot locker at gym at work on Mon and Wed (for Tue and Thur/Fri). On these days I try and sneak out of work to go for a quick jog either at lunch or late afternoon as the markets die down. Take the 5:56 or 6:18 train home. Sometimes I can't do the afternoon run from work, so will do at 8:00 after putting kids to bed. Sometimes skip it.

Saturday and Sunday I run usually when the kids are napping. Run a long workout where the total quantity can be as much as 15 miles on Sat and up to 20 on Sun.

That's at least the schedule right now. My mileage will fluctuate depending on if I can run during work hours and if not, if I can motivate to go at 8:00 knowing I have to get up and do it the next morning early.

As far as energy levels... I'm not a good sleeper. So more then the running, this kills me. I'll be in bed for 8 hours, but frequently only actually sleep 4-5 hours. My energy wanes throughout the day, but not enough to effect work performance. I usually drink 2 cups of coffee, and am pretty grumpy if I don't. Don't really watch what I eat, but try and be relatively healthy. My metabolism goes crazy when I run a decent amount, so I just try and avoid wasting away.

The key is to stay busy at work. As soon as it slows down (like in the summers) its tough to keep your head in it. You find that the tiredness leads to daydreaming (usually about running) and lethargy. If you can motivate to create some project for yourself during that time, it helps to alleviate tiredness.

I also find I go for a walk outside almost every day for 15 minutes to clear my head and get fresh air. This helps to wake me up and keep me focused.